this post was submitted on 16 Oct 2024
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Been more than a month but it’s more visible now that it’s not a ”both sides” issue
He's been showing his age for a long time - there's a reason he had to take a dementia test during his presidency. But it hasn't been "turn Q&A into standing around listening to music without warning" bad until very recently. Seems like a sharp turn downward started around the start of August?
I think it was before August that I started hearing about how he would change his train of thought mid-sentence and shit like that
I can't remember a time he wasn't like that.
Have you read any of his speeches since 2016? He changes subject several times each sentence and that is just the default setting.
Nothing like now though. There’s a clear difference. He would pivot, but now he seems lost
I'd argue though that it has accelerated much more rapidly this month or so, but I admit that could be more so just me not picking up on it as much earlier
For whatever reason, I’d imagine he is under a great deal of stress and anxiety. Maybe it’s the rise of Kamala, or him being shot at; maybe both, and more that we’re not privy to yet.
As someone that suffers from mental illness myself, I can say with certainty that increases in stress and anxiety will always make mental illness worse. I can only imagine what it does to dementia.
He seems to have lost weight as well and the timeline for that happening seems short to me. If that is the case and you couple that with an apparent loss of grey matter, he is probably not doing great.
While I don't wish harm on anyone, I am absolutely not going to shed a tear if he is in a sharp decline. (The GOP will spit him out the second he fails to be useful, so that will be fun to watch.)
It all depends on how many of his speeches you watch. People have been doing analysis of his phraseology for several years now, clearly identifying an apparent decline in vocal prowess.